For all of his genius, Elon Musk is the ultimate crony capitalist. This is not new technology or even a new product, just new marketing. You see Tesla has excess production capability at the battery plant that you and I built for him. So he has worked a deal with the DOE that will require every power producing company in the United States to use battery technology as part of their "smart grid" whether or not it was part of their original design. That's right, Georgia Power MUST buy Elon's batteries. But he has estimated that this will not quite get his taxpayer financed plant up to capacity.
Enter his latest deal with the DOE. As part of the government subsidy to home solar users, you as a consumer MUST use lithium ion batteries instead of lead acid (not a done deal yet but more than a safe bet). Of course, he will also sell you the battery packs as part of a power back-up system or as a replacement for an existing solar installation.
So here we have perhaps the sweetest deal ever. Here we have a billionaire who is manufacturing something that the government requires people to buy in a plant completely financed by the taxpayer. It doesn't get any better than this folks. Oh, wait. It does. His car plant is also financed by the taxpayer, his Space-X plant is financed by the taxpayer, and of course the taxpayer in the form of NASA is by far his biggest customer for all of his space related hardware. Lets also not forget the sweet taxpayer subsidized deal that NASA got him on surplus rocket motors from Russia.
So you see, genius can be used for evil as well as good. It really isn't Elon's fault though, we were stupid enough to elect a government willing to throw money at him. I guess we really can't blame him for picking some of it up off the ground.
Oh yes, and it is no coincidence that he announced this "new" product two days after he missed his profit projections by a butt load for the fourth quarter. In fact, he lost $108 million last quarter.
